According to U. Government reports ecommerce continues to improve dramatically, “Total e-commerce sales for 2006 were estimated at $108.7 billion, an increase of 23.5 percent (±3.3%) from 2005.

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This is not surprising when you consider that 60% of all new small businesses have an online presence. This is further enhanced when you take into account the meteoric rise of online users. In 2001 there were approximately 142 million online users. By 2006 there were approximately 211 million online users (many of whom enjoy not fighting traffic to find the products they want).
Online spending increased among all user groups from 2001-2005.

It is anticipated that an online consumer will spend in excess of $800 with an ecommerce business this year.
What makes this statistic all the more remarkable is that if you have an online business presence you gain access to a marketplace with 211 million potential customers who may be willing to spend money with your online business.
It may be that you are looking at $800 per online consumer and thinking, “That’s not nearly as much as I thought.” It is true that at the present time individuals will spend more in traditional brick and mortar stores than they will online, but the bigger picture has to do with a potential customer base that is global in scale. Each individual customer may spend less with you than they might in a traditional store environment, but you have so many more potential customers to market to.
Long story short, you have the capability of tapping into a revenue stream that is unavailable in more brick and mortar stores.
Why do you think some of the largest box stores develop an online presence? It is a cost effective way to manage a global customer base. It allows these large retailers to fill in the gaps where their retail presence is not available.
In essence these larger stores are finding their online stores to function as a high tech catalogue. Where once catalogues were rushed to homes throughout the US, now they are often sent only on request with a large portion of their customers perusing their online offerings for the most recent offerings, size and price.

It’s clear to see the growth of online sales can level the playing field for ecommerce stores. Your location on the web is only limited to your willingness to work at Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategies and other marketing efforts.
In the end, the use of an online store is an effective way to manage business in a competitive and global environment.